The Duchess mumbled something indistinguishable and waved for her daughter to proceed.
* * *
George Grayson was almost more than Nanny Wilkes could handle by herself. At ten-years-old, the rambunctious boy had much rather be outside, currying his horse, striding across the fields, climbing a tree or—most importantly for him—drawing. Anything, rather than memorizing the absolutely boring succession of kings and queens. Not to mention grammar, maths, or—God forbid—Latin, although he did rather enjoy reading adventure novels, when Nanny would let him, and music.
Fair-haired, good-looking, and with a generous smile, he had avoided the sturdiness of his father or the wiriness of his mother and fell somewhere in between with a strong, slim body well adapted to the many outside activities he enjoyed.
His sisters—Ann, Charlotte, and Betsy had their classes early in the morning, but George was tutored by himself in the late morning and afternoon, as he was the heir and it was thought that he needed a more substantial education.
However, this morning, George was surprised to find a young girl, named Lucy, also attending his instruction.
After being introduced by Nanny Wilkes, Lucy sat very quietly looking up at George as he wrote out his maths assignment on a blackboard. Lucy began touching her fingers in strange ways that made no sense to him. For some reason, this unnerved him, and he finally turned to her and asked, “Miss Lucy, what are you doing with your hands?”
“Just following along with what you are doing,” she said. “And the answer to the second equation be wrong.”
“Is wrong,” Nanny corrected without looking up.
George returned to the problem, studied it, and made the correction. He turned to her with a big smile and asked, “You did that all in your head?”
“Oh, yes,” she answered.
Nanny Wilkes who had been attending to other matters asked Lucy, “Do you attend a school?”
“No, Nanny Wilkes. I just know these things.”
Now George was intrigued, and he intently studied the young girl. How pretty she was, he realized, and smart too it seemed. He went over and kneeled down before her.
“Can you read?” he asked.
“My brother, Harold, taught me some, but I have no writing except with a stick on the ground.”
George looked up at Nanny. “Can you teach her?”
Nanny prevaricated. “Oh, I do not know if there will be time. The Duke and Duchess are yet to tell me how long she will be here.”
Turning back to Lucy, he asked, “Do you have other family somewhere else?”
“Just my family here.” She began to tear up. “Sisters, brothers, Mommy, Papa and me Nan. All gone.”
She threw her arms around George’s neck and began to sob. “I will never see them no more.”
George was moved and held her in his arms.
Nanny tutted and fussed with the papers on her desk. “Master George, it is still lesson time. Best get back to it.”
Lucy let go of George and sat back on her small chair and wiped her eyes with the backs of her hands.
George turned to Nanny and asked, “What will happen to her if she has nowhere to go?”
“Oh, Master George, there is no way to know. Your mother and father will sort it all out for whatever is best, I am certain. Now finish your math problems and let us move on to Latin grammar, shall we?”
George stood up and offered his hand to Lucy. “No, Nanny. This is a matter that needs to be resolved right now. Lucy? Come with me.”
She took it, and they left the schoolroom.
* * *
George marched directly to his father’s study, where he thought he might be at this time of the morning, but he was not there.
